No comments on the game so far? - are we all still shell shocked by the penalty decision or the fact that our strikers and midfield couldn't score in a proverbial.
61% posession, 10 shots (to their 3 off target attempts) and 6 corners to their 1 - and we still couldn't win.
Altrincham were a very poor side who showed almost no inclination or ideas about going forward which makes the result even more dissapointing. Even with the dodgy penalty we should have been 3 or 4 up by then and it shouldn't have mattered. We created enough chances but desperately need somebody who can keep their head in front of goal. Even Burgess fluffed a gilt-edged chance that normally you would expect him to have taken in his stride.
Altrincham Anybody?
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Kernow Yellow
- Grumpy old git
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Re: Altrincham Anybody?
I think it's more to do with the fact that the website's been down for 48 hours."Mally" wrote:No comments on the game so far? - are we all still shell shocked by the penalty decision or the fact that our strikers and midfield couldn't score in a proverbial.
No comments because of Pipex I believe.
Yes we played them off the park and created some chances. But we didn't have balance with Day on the left. This meant we didn't stretch them past breaking point.
We also depend solely on Yemi for pace, we need to be able to run quickly at defenders in more than one area of the park.
We now know what teams will do when they come to us and I believe that we need another pacey player in the squad.
The balance problem is hard to over come when all three wide left players are out injured.
Basham and Yemi are going to mean much less hit and hope balls down the pitch on Friday.
Yes we played them off the park and created some chances. But we didn't have balance with Day on the left. This meant we didn't stretch them past breaking point.
We also depend solely on Yemi for pace, we need to be able to run quickly at defenders in more than one area of the park.
We now know what teams will do when they come to us and I believe that we need another pacey player in the squad.
The balance problem is hard to over come when all three wide left players are out injured.
Basham and Yemi are going to mean much less hit and hope balls down the pitch on Friday.
Every time I look at the division 4 table, the one thing that makes me fume more than anything is the number of ambitionless sides that were near the bottom before we went bad, were are the bottom in our one bad season and are there again this year. With the excpetion of Boston, they all also appear to be from around Manchester.
The one plus of the conference I thought, was that there were teams here with a touch of ambition, who wanted to make something of themselves and progress - I'd even heard some of them actually try to play football.
How depressing therefore that the one time this season that I actually get the chance to watch a game, we come up against the one Mancunian-based bunch of ambitionless pub-thug no-hopers that are not joining their neighbours in clogging up the basement of the Football League.
I really enjoyed the first half, watching an Oxford side actually pass to each other, create chances, show energy and commitment, even piece whole moves together. But after the goal, when their clumpsters reverted to pub-mode, we lost our way, and the ref lost it, is probably the most depressed at and after a football game I have been since the Boston farce 12 months ago (and yes I was at the Orient game).
I'm certainly going to think twice before I make the effort to get to a game again.
Two areas for specific comment though:
The ref - not entirely to blame of course, but should not be allowed to get away without comment on two things at least.
i) decisions - I can understand a ref not giving or underpunishing things (eg. Duffy pen, stamp on burgess, attempt to put yemi into row Z) if he didnt see them properly or was not sure or brave enough, but I cannot understand them then giving the more pathetic type of decision such as their penalty, particularly against the home side.
ii) time - why did the stoppage time board appear after only 43 mins of second half and show only 4 minutes (effectively meaning only two were played). Three subs = 90 secs, burgess injury say 90 secs, picking up Yemi off the concrete = 90 secs, general confusion before able to explain he'd given a penalty = a good two minutes, plus many other stoppages and the late start to the second half meant we should still have been playing after 5 o'clock.
OK, another trivial point in many ways, and would probably only given us more time to miss chances, but it is still a very basic failing which should not go without comment.
Putting those two aside, as I suppose we should, my other main thought was Smith's handling of the game:
- why send Gunn out on loan, when so many defenders are struggling with injury or suspension? Sure, give him some experience but not when we might need him.
- why no subs? - again I know we only had three fit outfield players left to go on the bench, but that still does not mean they cannot be used. Dempster was having a nightmare from the start, so really should not have been left out there to suffer. Alty changed things around after we scored and we lost all control on the game. Some sort of move from the bench would have shaken things up and served to restore concentration and control.
- why no last effort - there was still no change after the equaliser, where surely the pace of Beechers might have served to cause some disruption and give us a chance to win.
- it really is looking like our three young pros will never get a game - ho hum!
The one plus of the conference I thought, was that there were teams here with a touch of ambition, who wanted to make something of themselves and progress - I'd even heard some of them actually try to play football.
How depressing therefore that the one time this season that I actually get the chance to watch a game, we come up against the one Mancunian-based bunch of ambitionless pub-thug no-hopers that are not joining their neighbours in clogging up the basement of the Football League.
I really enjoyed the first half, watching an Oxford side actually pass to each other, create chances, show energy and commitment, even piece whole moves together. But after the goal, when their clumpsters reverted to pub-mode, we lost our way, and the ref lost it, is probably the most depressed at and after a football game I have been since the Boston farce 12 months ago (and yes I was at the Orient game).
I'm certainly going to think twice before I make the effort to get to a game again.
Two areas for specific comment though:
The ref - not entirely to blame of course, but should not be allowed to get away without comment on two things at least.
i) decisions - I can understand a ref not giving or underpunishing things (eg. Duffy pen, stamp on burgess, attempt to put yemi into row Z) if he didnt see them properly or was not sure or brave enough, but I cannot understand them then giving the more pathetic type of decision such as their penalty, particularly against the home side.
ii) time - why did the stoppage time board appear after only 43 mins of second half and show only 4 minutes (effectively meaning only two were played). Three subs = 90 secs, burgess injury say 90 secs, picking up Yemi off the concrete = 90 secs, general confusion before able to explain he'd given a penalty = a good two minutes, plus many other stoppages and the late start to the second half meant we should still have been playing after 5 o'clock.
OK, another trivial point in many ways, and would probably only given us more time to miss chances, but it is still a very basic failing which should not go without comment.
Putting those two aside, as I suppose we should, my other main thought was Smith's handling of the game:
- why send Gunn out on loan, when so many defenders are struggling with injury or suspension? Sure, give him some experience but not when we might need him.
- why no subs? - again I know we only had three fit outfield players left to go on the bench, but that still does not mean they cannot be used. Dempster was having a nightmare from the start, so really should not have been left out there to suffer. Alty changed things around after we scored and we lost all control on the game. Some sort of move from the bench would have shaken things up and served to restore concentration and control.
- why no last effort - there was still no change after the equaliser, where surely the pace of Beechers might have served to cause some disruption and give us a chance to win.
- it really is looking like our three young pros will never get a game - ho hum!
I’m not sure all the criticism is justified regarding lack of pace up front, certain individual performances (although I agree Dempster was poor) and the team not being balanced. It is a fact that we created a bucket full of chances. I can’t remember when we had so many. The problem, to state the blindingly obvious, is that our finishing was dreadful. I would be much more worried if we had not created anything.
Having said that, if it wasn’t for that ******** (insert whatever word of whatever length you feel appropriate) of a referee we would still have won. I think Mooro’s description of the thuggish Altrincham side is spot on. But the problem is that the referee let them get away with it. To add to Mooro’s comments – When the referee tried to give an Altrincham thug a talking to the player just ran away. Instead of making the player return to the scene of the crime the referee chased after him and even once the player had been caught up the ref had to continue to jog along side whilst he had his little chat. So they had established how weak / crap the referee was and played on this. Or had they? He seemed rather friendly with the opposition as they were shaking his hand and celebrating around him as they left the pitch.
The Altrincham manager got on my nerves too – to say that we didn’t like it because Altrincham got stuck in and what did we expect was b*****s. As long as it is within the letter of the law faIr enough, but a lot of what went on on Saturday was not.
Worryingly I think we’ve got more of this to come.
Having said that, if it wasn’t for that ******** (insert whatever word of whatever length you feel appropriate) of a referee we would still have won. I think Mooro’s description of the thuggish Altrincham side is spot on. But the problem is that the referee let them get away with it. To add to Mooro’s comments – When the referee tried to give an Altrincham thug a talking to the player just ran away. Instead of making the player return to the scene of the crime the referee chased after him and even once the player had been caught up the ref had to continue to jog along side whilst he had his little chat. So they had established how weak / crap the referee was and played on this. Or had they? He seemed rather friendly with the opposition as they were shaking his hand and celebrating around him as they left the pitch.
The Altrincham manager got on my nerves too – to say that we didn’t like it because Altrincham got stuck in and what did we expect was b*****s. As long as it is within the letter of the law faIr enough, but a lot of what went on on Saturday was not.
Worryingly I think we’ve got more of this to come.
Last edited by Baboo on Mon Oct 16, 2006 8:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Resurrection Ox
- Puberty
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- Joined: Tue May 16, 2006 9:45 pm
Re:
- it really is looking like our three young pros will never get a game - ho hum![/quote]
if you'fd been to more ganmes this season you'd see clear evidence - ho hum - that smith does not in fact rate the young lads.
the ref should be blamed 150% for a quite diabolical penalty decision. a right brown paper bag job if you ask me.
disgraceful. disgraceful. disgraceful.
if you'fd been to more ganmes this season you'd see clear evidence - ho hum - that smith does not in fact rate the young lads.
the ref should be blamed 150% for a quite diabolical penalty decision. a right brown paper bag job if you ask me.
disgraceful. disgraceful. disgraceful.
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Resurrection Ox
- Puberty
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Re:
i look forward to the altrincham return fixture. lets go and stuff them 7-0. i would imagine the team will be up for it. smith will not lack motivation."Baboo" wrote:I’m not sure all the criticism is justified regarding lack of pace up front, certain individual performances (although I agree Dempster was poor) and the team not being balanced. It is a fact that we created a bucket full of chances. I can’t remember when we had so many. The problem, to state the blindingly obvious, is that our finishing was dreadful. I would be much more worried if we had not created anything.
Having said that, if it wasn’t for that ******** (insert whatever word of whatever length you feel appropriate) of a referee we would still have won. I think Mooro’s description of the thuggish Altrincham side is spot on. But the problem is that the referee let them get away with it. To add to Mooro’s comments – When the referee tried to give an Altrincham thug a talking to the player just ran away. Instead of making the player return to the scene of the crime the referee chased after him and even once the player had been caught up the ref had to continue to jog along side whilst he had his little chat. So they had established how weak / crap the referee was and played on this. Or had they? He seemed rather friendly with the opposition as they were shaking his hand and celebrating around him as they left the pitch.
The Altrincham manager got on my nerves too – to say that we didn’t like it because Altrincham got stuck in and what did we expect was b*****s. As long as it is within the letter of the law far enough, but a lot of what went on on Saturday was not.
Worryingly I think we’ve got more of this to come.
Re:
My feelings exactly."Resurrection Ox" wrote:[
i look forward to the altrincham return fixture. lets go and stuff them 7-0. i would imagine the team will be up for it. smith will not lack motivation.
I only recall ever remember leaving a match feeling so angry on two other occassions - the Slumdon Roy Burton smoke bomb match and after the Joe Ross performance.
Re:
You forgot about Chelsea and that Kevin Francis "penalty"."Baboo" wrote:My feelings exactly."Resurrection Ox" wrote:[
i look forward to the altrincham return fixture. lets go and stuff them 7-0. i would imagine the team will be up for it. smith will not lack motivation.
I only recall ever remember leaving a match feeling so angry on two other occassions - the Slumdon Roy Burton smoke bomb match and after the Joe Ross performance.
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Matt D
- Middle-Aged Spread
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- Location: Stayed at the Manor.
i felt more angry about the southport game, becuase it was the first time i'd seen a team in this league push us around and the ref let them.
i said after that match it would happen again, and what is the plan?
you can rant against altrincham if you want - but god knows what their wage bill is, certainly not enough to afford an andy burgess to ping the ball round and play attacking football. so they picked a game plan that played to the 'strengths' of their players and try and pick up a point at the league leaders - and it worked. it's up to us to beat what's in front of us, so i found myself asking again after this game, when a team plays like that and the ref allows them to, what's our plan?
for what it's worth, my view was that this was a case of missed chances. better finishing would have seen us clear quickly in that game.
i understand mooro's frustration, but if we want to get out of this league then we have to learn to live with those kind of games.
i said after that match it would happen again, and what is the plan?
you can rant against altrincham if you want - but god knows what their wage bill is, certainly not enough to afford an andy burgess to ping the ball round and play attacking football. so they picked a game plan that played to the 'strengths' of their players and try and pick up a point at the league leaders - and it worked. it's up to us to beat what's in front of us, so i found myself asking again after this game, when a team plays like that and the ref allows them to, what's our plan?
for what it's worth, my view was that this was a case of missed chances. better finishing would have seen us clear quickly in that game.
i understand mooro's frustration, but if we want to get out of this league then we have to learn to live with those kind of games.
I think you're being harsh for a number of reason there mooro. It's a bit much to expect part-time teams like Altrincham to turn up and play nicely, showing our lot respect and letting them have time on the ball. Their best chance of a result is to defend, be physical and try and nick a goal. Ian Atkins has based a whole career on these tactics after all. Ultimately the team have to overcome this by battling and then taking the chances. Obviously it's the ref's job to stop it becoming over physical and from the sounds of it he failed, but don't fool yourself into romantically thinking that we'd be any different playing against a side with better quality.
As for the Manchester based pub cloggers, don't confuse inertia with a lack of ambition (Macclesfield just sacked Brian Horton for instance, haha, which shows ambition). For the likes of Bury, Macclesfield and Stockport staying in the football league is quite a struggle currently. Macclesfield, for instance (who I went to watch on saturday), have survived on crowds of around 2000 and this season are charging just £10 admittance in a failed attempt to boost the attendance - they're struggling after the football league fined them last season (although the season before they made the playoffs) and their trust is heavily involved in running the club. Stockport were only taken over by their Trust last season and are experiencing the same problems most trust run club experience. More importantly, with our crowds and facilities, the fact that we're in the division BELOW these clubs who are experiencing serious problems show exactly how badly the club has been run over the last few years.
Young players, as was said above, it's pretty obvious Smith doesn't rate our current lot and I'm not going to argue with him - my feeling is things have changed on this, any seriously promising youngsters we have are likely to get poached by higher division teams. The likes of Blackstock, for instance, would clearly have played for us if we were league 1, but league 2 and conference football is not much of an attraction to players with a genuine chance of making it.
As for the Manchester based pub cloggers, don't confuse inertia with a lack of ambition (Macclesfield just sacked Brian Horton for instance, haha, which shows ambition). For the likes of Bury, Macclesfield and Stockport staying in the football league is quite a struggle currently. Macclesfield, for instance (who I went to watch on saturday), have survived on crowds of around 2000 and this season are charging just £10 admittance in a failed attempt to boost the attendance - they're struggling after the football league fined them last season (although the season before they made the playoffs) and their trust is heavily involved in running the club. Stockport were only taken over by their Trust last season and are experiencing the same problems most trust run club experience. More importantly, with our crowds and facilities, the fact that we're in the division BELOW these clubs who are experiencing serious problems show exactly how badly the club has been run over the last few years.
Young players, as was said above, it's pretty obvious Smith doesn't rate our current lot and I'm not going to argue with him - my feeling is things have changed on this, any seriously promising youngsters we have are likely to get poached by higher division teams. The likes of Blackstock, for instance, would clearly have played for us if we were league 1, but league 2 and conference football is not much of an attraction to players with a genuine chance of making it.
Ok so how many clear cut chances did we miss on Saturday?
Dempster in the first half.
Burgess in the second half wasn't (for me) because Yemi passed it behind him.
Duffy was over compensating for the 'greedy' jibe from Jim by, on two or three occasions, laying the ball off and not going on himself.
Their goalie made a great save from a header in the first half, but Duffy was already offside. Apart from that I can't remember him having a 'worldy'.
I think we dominated play, got lots of action in the top third of the pitch, but didn't turn that into lots of clear cut scoring chances.
I think with more pace and more width in our team we will overcome the negatives tactics employed against us more easily.
Dempster in the first half.
Burgess in the second half wasn't (for me) because Yemi passed it behind him.
Duffy was over compensating for the 'greedy' jibe from Jim by, on two or three occasions, laying the ball off and not going on himself.
Their goalie made a great save from a header in the first half, but Duffy was already offside. Apart from that I can't remember him having a 'worldy'.
I think we dominated play, got lots of action in the top third of the pitch, but didn't turn that into lots of clear cut scoring chances.
I think with more pace and more width in our team we will overcome the negatives tactics employed against us more easily.
Re:
There was more than that I'm sure - but the question is when does a chance become aclear cut chance. What about when we hit the bar?"DLT" wrote:Ok so how many clear cut chances did we miss on Saturday?
Dempster in the first half.
Burgess in the second half wasn't (for me) because Yemi passed it behind him.
Duffy was over compensating for the 'greedy' jibe from Jim by, on two or three occasions, laying the ball off and not going on himself.
Their goalie made a great save from a header in the first half, but Duffy was already offside. Apart from that I can't remember him having a 'worldy'.
I think we dominated play, got lots of action in the top third of the pitch, but didn't turn that into lots of clear cut scoring chances.
I think with more pace and more width in our team we will overcome the negatives tactics employed against us more easily.
As for the Duffy already off side incident - the ref allowed play to go on but I thought there was a slim chance that the keeper had scrambled the ball back from just over the line.